The Hornets appear to be stuck in the NBA’s no-man’s land—too good to get a top lottery pick, yet not good enough to make a real dent in the conference’s playoff race. However, despite the status, new GM Mitch Kupchak isn’t ready to undergo a full rebuild, as Rick Bonnell of the Charlotte Observer relays.
“I don’t know the ins and outs much. I don’t know if that is the right word or not. To sit here and say this is a team that needs to be rebuilt, I don’t know if that’s fair,” Kupchak said at today’s introductory press conference.
The GM added he hasn’t made a decision yet on the status of coach Steve Clifford and that he doesn’t feel pressure to trade Kemba Walker.
“I don’t think [his distaste for losing is] something to overreact to. I want a player who doesn’t want to lose. That’s a good thing. I’m aware of [Walker’s comments]. Over the next several days, I will have player interviews. My understanding is he has another year under contract. It’s clearly a very favorable contract [for the team, at $12MM], but he’s going to be just fine going forward. I’m very aware of his talent. From what I hear, he’s great in the locker room and great in the community. I don’t know why you wouldn’t want that going forward.”
Kupchak talked about his approach to analytics, telling the media that if all others things are equal in evaluating a player, he’s trusting his instincts over the numbers.
“Gut instinct has been a big part of talent evaluation: watching the player, watching the player walking to the bench, how he interacts with the coach. Scouting games in person. Those things are the biggest,” he said. “Over the last 15 years, with the introduction of cameras on top of each building basically like GPS, it’s created a whole new form of data. That creates so much data every night; data uploaded every night and you have to have people to evaluate that data. That’s how the business has really changed.
“Every GM is different [as far as] confirming your instincts as a GM. If it ever was a tie I’d always go to my instincts. Might be 70-30 or 60-40.”
Charlotte is currently slotted to pick 11th in the upcoming draft, as our Reverse Standings indicate. In picking that far down the lottery, Kupchak believes the obvious strategy is simply taking the best available player.
“If we’re picking around 10 or 11, you would almost always go with the best player. If it was close, you might go with position. But you can always trade players if you have duplication,” he said.
